Bolt latches are commonly used to secure doors, bins, overhead lockers, etc., particularly in the interior of aircraft and marine vessels to allow opening for access and closing to lock or secure.
For decades the aerospace and marine industries has offered latches of similar appearance and operation leaving the users in the industry with few choices and a lack of variety in esthetic appearance from which to choose latches for aircraft, yachts or the like.
One reason there is very little variety in the appearance and styles of latches is the cost of manufacture and tooling. Casting is the way to make latches affordable and to cover the complexity of a latch which is manufactured as a unitary assembly. An example of such a unitary assembly is described in Andrews U.S. Pat. No. 1,995,338. However, manufacturing costs for a unitary latch assembly are very costly due to the complexity of the parts. The unitary latch assembly requires a more expensive mold for casting and is complex to manufacture by machining.